PAULA TRIVETTE
BILL TRIVETTE
US ARMY
Section Flags and Heroes Row K

Bill and Paula married in 1976 in the Post Chapel at Ft. Sam Houston, TX.

As Paula tells it, she “was assigned to Fort Sam Houston for my first nursing assignment where I fell in love with Intensive Care Nursing and at the same time I intensely fell in love with a young, dashing Army captain by the name of Bill Trivette.” Bill was studying law at St. Mary’s University School of Law in San Antonio when he met a beautiful Army nurse named Paula. Bill says meeting and marrying Paula was by far the best thing that ever happened to him.

Paula was born in Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin the 9th of 18 children.
Money was tight growing up with such a large family. Paula had to work throughout her childhood to pay for her high school tuition, books, and uniforms. In her senior year in high school, she applied for and won a Walter Reed Army Institute of Nursing (WRAIN) scholarship, a four year fully funded program that resulted in a Bachelors degree and commission in the Army Nurse Corps as a first lieutenant.

Bill was born in Winston-Salem, but his family moved to Albemarle, NC, shortly after his birth. It was an enjoyable middle-class childhood growing up in a small southern town in postwar USA. Bill was active in scouting and he obtained Eagle rank. Bill’s father had served in the Navy during WWII and Bill’s Scout Master had been a WWII paratrooper. Bill was raised to respect military service as a result of the influence of his dad and his Scout Master.

After high school graduation Bill attended the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, NY. He was commissioned in June 1970 as an Infantry Officer. He reported to Fort Benning, GA, for Infantry Officers Basic, followed by Airborne and Ranger schools. His first assignment was with B Company, 3d Airborne Infantry Battalion, 82d Airborne Division at Ft. Bragg. In 1972 he attended the Special Forces Officers’ Course at Bragg on his way to assignment to the 2d Infantry Division in Korea. He was assigned to duty as a 4.2 inch mortar platoon leader on the Demilitarized Zone from December 1972 until January 1974. Upon return to the United States, he was assigned as an A Team Detachment Commander with 5th Special Forces Group at Ft. Bragg. Bill found service with Special Forces his most rewarding during his first five years in the Army. He served with outstanding NCO’s and officers there. During time with Special Forces he successfully completed multiple schools, including: SF Scuba School at Key West, Florida; Pathfinder School at Fort Benning, GA; SF Weapons School at Ft. Bragg; and Turkish Language training.

As Bill approached the end of his five-year commitment, he was accepted into the Army’s Legal Education Program, which would allow him to obtain his law degree and to serve as an Army lawyer in the Judge Advocate General’s Corps (JAG).

It was at this point in their careers that Bill and Paula met.

Two years after marrying, the Trivettes reported to Fort Carson, CO. Paula was the head Nurse of a Surgical Intensive Care Unit and Bill was assigned to a variety of legal jobs in the JAG Office. Their first son, Evan, was born in 1980 at the Army hospital where Paula worked.

The couple was then transferred to Frankfurt, Germany in the summer of 1981. Paula served in the 97th General Hospital (a former WWII German Army Hospital). She became an evening/night supervisor where she dealt with many medevac patients en route to the United States. Bill served a year as a defense counsel and other administrative legal jobs. Paula gave birth to their second son, Eric, in 1984, shortly before being reassigned to the Washington, D.C. area.

Paula was assigned to Walter Reed Army Medical Center, ultimately as the Head Nurse of the largest Intensive care unit in the Army. This was a very demanding supervisory job but she performed her duties so well that she was nominated by the Nurse Corps for a position as a White House nurse.

There is an amusing story about Paula’s next assignment. After two busy years supervising the ICU, Paula told her supervisor that she needed a change. A few days later, her supervisor asked her if she would want a job at the White House. Paula thought she was talking about a restaurant up the street from Walter Reed called the White House! Her supervisor laughed and said “No, the real WHITE HOUSE” as a nurse. Paula was nominated and selected. She served as a White House Nurse from 1987-1993, two and a half years for Ronald Reagan and four years with Georg Bush Senior. It was a window in history she was honored to be a part of. She traveled all over the world and United States in advance of the presidents’ trips. She set up medical emergency plans for each location and later traveled with the President.

After leaving Germany Bill was first assigned in the Army Litigation Division in the Pentagon. There, he learned about civil litigation in the federal courts throughout the United States. Bill next became a Regional Defense Counsel and was responsible for Army Defense Counsel in the Northeast United States.

Bill and Paula retired from the Army in 1993 and moved to Greensboro, NC. Paula took up nursing at Moses Cone Hospital and Bill started a 20-year career with the federal public defender where he represented defendants in federal criminal court. Bill left the federal public defender in 2013 and began a private practice of criminal law. Paula retired from Moses Cone in 1993. Bill and Paula are actively involved in volunteer work.